The special prosecutor in the case has filed a notice of appeal, arguing the trial judge failed to consider all of the evidence and failed to apply the correct legal test when determining whether the Crown proved its case.

Testimony at Braidwood Inquiry questioned

Bentley's legal troubles began when he tried to explain during the 2009 Braidwood Inquiry the differences between what could be seen on amateur video and what he initially told homicide investigators.

A bystander captured video images of the four RCMP officers taking down Robert Dziekanski with a Taser on Oct. 14, 2007, at Vancouver airport. ((Paul Pritchard))

In his ruling, Justice Mark McEwan wrote that the Crown prosecutors "advanced a suspicion based largely on circumstantial evidence," but failed to prove that Bentley had colluded with the other officers to knowingly make a false statement intended to mislead the inquiry.

McEwan concluded that although Bentley and the other officers made similar statements in their testimony that were ultimately shown to be wrong by a bystander's video of the incident, other independent witnesses also made similar mistakes in their statements.